The Pulaski citizen. [volume] (Pulaski, Tenn.) 1866-current, 1887-07-28

and from home to home, looking for q
place where there had been no sorrow and
where there had been no death, but she
found none. She went back to the god
Veda and said: ''My mission is failure;
you see | haven't brought the mustard
seed; can't find place where there has
been no sorrow and no death" ''Oh,"
says the god Veda, understand your sor-
rows are no worse than the sorrows of
others; we all have our griefs and all
have our heartbreaks. .
Laugh and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone;
For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth,
But has trouble enough of its own.
We hear a great deal Of discussion now
all over the land about why people do
not go to church. Some say it is because
Christianity is dying out, and because
people do not believe in the truth of
God S word, and all that. They are false
reasons. The reason is because our ser
mons and exhortations are not interest
ing, and practical, and helpful. Some
one might as well tell the whole truth on
this subject, and 50 l viii tell it. The
religious discourse of the future, the
Gospel sermon to come forth and shake
the nations and lift the people out of
darkness, will be a popular sermon, just
for the simple reason that it will meet
the woes and the wants and the anxieties
Of the people.
There are in all our denominations
ecclesiastical mummies sitting around to
frOwn upon the fresh young pulplts of
America, to try to awe them down, to
cry out, Tut! tut! tut! Sensational!'
They stand today preaching in churches
that hold thousand people, and there
are hundred persons present, and if
they cannot have the world saved in their
way it seems as if they do not want it
saved at all.
do not know but the old way of max
ing ministers Of the Gospel is better-a
collegiate education and an apprentice
ship under the care and home attention
of some earnest, aged Christian minister,
the young man getting the patriarch's
spirit and assisting him in his religious
service. Young lawyers study with old
lawyers, young physicians with old
physicians, and believe it would be a
great help if every young man studying
for the Gospel ministry could put himself
in the home. and heart, and sympathy,
and under the benedictinn and perpetual
presence of Christian minister.
But | remark again, the religious dis
course of the future will be an awakening
sermon. From altar rail to the front
doorstep under that sermon an audience
will get up and start for heaven. There
will be in it many a staccato passage. 1t
will not be a lullaby; it will be a battle
oh
they will feel the hot breath of pursuing
retribution on the back Of their necks.
1t will be sympathetic with all the phys
iCal distresses as well as the spiritual dis
tresses Of the world. Christ not only
preached but he healed paralysis, and he
healed epilepsy, and he healed the dumb
and the blind and ten lepers.
That religious discourse of the future
viii be an everyday sermon, going right
down into every mans life, and it will
teach him how to vote, how to bargain,
how to plow, how to do any work he is
called to, how to WELD trOwei and pen
and pencil and yardstick and plane. And
it will teach women how to preside over
their households, and how to educate
their children, and how to initiate
Miriam and Esther and Vashti and Eu-
NICE the mother of Timothy, and Mary,
the mother of Christ; and those women
WHO on northern and southern battle
fields were mistaken by the wounded for
angels of mercy fresh from the throne of
God
Yes, ] have to tell you the religious
| discourse of the future will be a re-
ported sermon. If you have any
idea that printing was invented
simply to print secular books, and
stenography and photography We're
cOntrived merely to set forth secular
IDEAS, you are mistaken. The printing
| press is 20 be the great agency of Gospel
proclamation. II is high time that good
men, instead of denouncing the press,
| employ it to scatter forth the Gospel of
Jesus Christ The vast majority of peo-
! pie in our cities do not come to church,
and nothing but the printed sermon can
reach them and call them to pardon and
life and peace AMI heaven.
SO | cannot understand the nervous
ness of some of my brethren of the min
istry. When they see a newspaper man
coming in they say: "Alas! there is re-
pQlt9r = Every added reporter is 10, 900,
!
/ the auditory. The ti1ne wall come when
all the village, town and city newspapers
will reproduce the Gospel of Jesus Christ
and sermons preached on the Sabbath will
reverpufata all around the world, and
some by type ana some by voice-all
nations viii be evangelical.
The practical bearing Of this is upon
! those WHO are engaged in Christian work,
not only upon theological students and
Young ministers, but upon al, WHO preach
the Gospel. and all who exhort in meet
ings. and that is all of you if you are
doing your duty. Do you eXhOrt in
PRAYER lnaeting? Be short and be spirited.
Do YOU teach in s5ioie class? Though you
have to study every night be interesting,
DO you accost people on the subject of
religion III th6;r homes or i'll public
places? Study adroitness a;ld use COM
mon sense. The most graceful and most
beautiful thing on earth is the religion of
Jesus Christ, and if you awkwardly pre-
sent it, it is defamation. We must DO
our work rapidly, and we must do it
effectively Soon oar time for work will
be gone.
A dying Christian took out his watch
end gave it to friend and said: Take
that watch. ! have no more use for it.:
time is ended for nS and eternity be-
gins. - Oh, my friends, when our watch
has licked away for us the last mo-
ment, and our clock has struck for us the
last hour, may it be found we did our
work well, that we did it in the very best
gEay, and whether we preached the Cos
pei in puipits. Qr taught Sabbath classes,
or administered to the sick as physicians,
or bargained as merchants, or pleaded
the law as attorneys, or were busy
as artisans, or as husbandmen, or as me-
chani@s or were like Martha called to
give meal to u nungry Christ, or like
Hannah to make a coat for Il pfopIat. or
like Deborah to rouse the courage of
some timid Barak iii the Lords conflict,
we did orr work in such a way that ii
aIH!5.l SS3 !; s. So: